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Topic: Tom Lehmann's NY Style Pizza (Read 517259 times)

JG, I still weigh my water and flour like steve and some of the others do. On the thin crust pizza we have been talking about the difference between 6oz and 5.8pz of water makes all the difference in the world.I have heard more than once TV chefs saying a cup of water weighs 8 oz while knowing it did not.Randy

I made Peter's recipe for a Lehman 16 inch NY style pizza last night. The dough turned out great and the pizza was fantastic. Thanks Peter, for the great and very precise recipe. The KASL flour also made a huge difference. Now I know what the big rage about KASL is all about. I had a few glitches in the pizza making process but they were all my fault and had nothing to do with the great NY style dough recipe. I stretched the dough too much to about 17 inches and, as a result, some of the crust hung over the edge of my pizza stone. The dough spread beautifully though - almost too easily.

The pizza was fantastic and very authentic NY style. Perhaps a slight bit too thin, but that was more because I stretched the dough too much, perhaps because the dough was a bit too extensible. Here's a couple thoughts and questions for discussion:

1.) What is the best way to reduce the extensibility somewhat? My guess would be one of three ways: a.) increasing the kneading time, b.) decreasing the hydration level slightly, or c.) dress the dough with a bit more flour just before the stretching of the dough, or d.) a little bit of all the aforementioned. Thoughts and opinions on this matter are welcomed and greatly appreciated.

2.) Realizing my error in stretching the dough too much to 17 inches, could this also be a good argument as to the advantages of using a pizza screen? With a screen, you never have to worry about incorrect sizes of your dough and/or disasters with the transition between your pizza peel and pizza stone. I haven't tried a screen yet, but I just ordered two of them.

As for ways to reduce the extensibility of the dough, I think you hit on some of the possble ways of doing so, but I don't think adding a bit more flour to the dough at the time of shaping will be all that effective. You might also be inclined to think that you can knead in a bit of extra flour and improve the elasticity. But I wouldn't do that since it will only mess up the gluten network of the dough and leave you with a dough that is so elastic that it will take you another hour or two to get the dough to behave as you'd like it.

I think reducing the hydration percent may be the best way to go. But I think you can also slow down the rate of fermentation by using cooler water or by using even less yeast. It might even be possible to increase the elasticity by letting the dough ferment for less than 24 hours before using, say, 18 hours. That way, the gluten won't have a chance to completely relax as a result of the chemical action that takes place in the dough.

If you figure it out, please let us know. I have learned to live with the high extensibilty and achieve decent results. Most of the time, the complaints are about too much elasticity and too little extensibility.

JG, I still weigh my water and flour like steve and some of the others do. On the thin crust pizza we have been talking about the difference between 6oz and 5.8pz of water makes all the difference in the world.I have heard more than once TV chefs saying a cup of water weighs 8 oz while knowing it did not.Randy

Randy, Thanks for the enlightenment on the water weight issues with the thin crust. My lacking of accuracy in water is probably why my thin crust never turned out to my liking, and therefore I had abondonded it. This has brought up a new interest in trying to get a decent thin crust, so I guess this seems like as good a time as any to place the NY/Neo style my family loves on hold and try again with the thin crust. Thanks again.JG

While vacationing recently in Mexico, I had the luxury of someone else making pizza for me. Some time ago, I had given my daughter-in-law a basic Lehmann NY style pizza dough recipe and some basic hands-on instruction on how to make the dough based on that recipe. With practice, and making some basic modifications to the recipe (noted below), she has managed to be able to make pizzas that are far better than available at any of the local Mexican restaurants that offer pizza on their menus. Her success has not gone unnoticed and she is now being asked to instruct others who have sampled her pizza on how to make pizzas at home. The recipe she followed was essentially the Lehmann recipe that I posted at Reply #9 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,576.0.html.

The major change to the recipe is that all-purpose flour (11.5% protein) was substituted for the high-gluten flour called for in the recipe and the quantity of dough was increased to permit making two 14-inch pizzas. The flour change was made for a simple reason: all-purpose flour is the only "white" flour available at the retail level in most parts of Mexico (the other common flour being whole wheat). We had the option of trying to boost the protein content of the all-purpose flour by adding vital wheat gluten, but my daughter-in-law nixed the idea because she wanted to use only the local ingredients, not some "strange" substance I had brought with me from the U.S.

The dough was made using the "dough" feature of her 11-cup Cuisinart food processor (a fairly recent Cuisinart model), and the dough ball was sufficient (at about 26 oz.) to make two dough balls, each of which could be used to make a 14-inch pizza. The dough was refrigerated for about 24 hours at a nice cool temperature of around 42 degrees F. During that time, the dough hardly rose at all, even though the dough was at a temperature of over 90 degrees F when it went into the refrigerator (and despite the use of cold water). After the 24-hour retardation, the dough was brought to room temperature (around 80 degrees F) in preparation for shaping. It took about 1 to 1 1/2 hours for the dough to reach the right condition for shaping. The dough was just about perfect in terms of elasticity, extensibility and ability to handle and shape and stretch into dough rounds. Each dough ball was shaped and stretched into a 14-inch round.

Both pizzas were baked in an Amana electric oven with a convection feature, using a combination of a pizza stone, which had been preheated for about an hour at around 500 degrees F, and a 14-inch pizza disk in one case and a 14-inch pizza screen in the second case. The first pizza, shown in the first photo below, was baked on the pizza disk (the first time I ever used such a disk) on the middle rack of the oven for about 7-8 minutes, following which the pizza was removed from the disk and placed on the pizza stone (at the bottom rack position) for about an additional 2-3 minutes to achieve increased bottom crust browning. The second pizza, shown in the second photo below, was baked in the same manner but using the pizza screen. Both pizzas used a sauce made from San Marzano tomatoes (DOP) that had been pureed in the food processor and cooked at low heat until enough liquid had evaporated to make a thick sauce. Dried oregano and basil, fresh garlic, dried red pepper flakes, and a small amount of sugar were added to the sauce for flavoring. The toppings were pre-cooked sausage (just until pink), sauteed mushrooms, diced red peppers, olive oil, and mozzarella cheese that had been purchased in block form from the nearest Sam's/Wal-Mart and then shredded. I might have liked to add some pepperoni slices, but the quality of Mexican pepperoni is below just about any pepperoni available in the U.S. Next time, I will just have to bring a U.S. brand with me to Mexico.

Both pizzas turned out very well and were very tasty and well received considering that all-purpose flour was used. The convection feature was also very useful, I thought. In fact, my daughter-in-law mentioned that she has been able to bake two 14-inch pizzas simultaneously using two preheated pizza stones, with good results, as a consequence of using the convection feature. At some point, I'd like to come up with a 16-inch Lehmann formulation using all-purpose flour that produces a crust of the same thickness as the two 14-inch pizzas my daughter-in-law made. I still believe that high-gluten flour and bread flour are more apt to produce better flavor and crust texture than all-purpose flour, but having a recipe available to use all-purpose flour is still a good thing to have when the other flours are not available for use.

Today, I took the basic Lehmann NY style dough recipe and, using the baker's percents, reformulated it for the 18-inch size and with a hydration percent of 63%. Although as a baker Yvonne Marie is unlikely to need volume measurements, I nonetheless weighed the flour and water on my digital scale as carefully as possible and have indicated those measurements also in the recipe posted below, for the benefit of those who may not have a scale but have experience in making minor adjustments to the dough as necessary during processing to achieve the desired characteristics of a properly kneaded dough. The processing techniques are essentially the same as those discussed in detail elsewhere in this thread, although I suspect Yvonne Marie will use a stand mixer to knead a dough of the weight produced by this formulation--almost 27 ounces (26.7 oz., to be a bit more exact). It's also possible that she will choose to use a cooler rather than a refrigerator for the retardation of the dough.

If Yvonne Marie decides to test out this particular formulation, I hope that she will report back to us on her results, one way or the other, so that we will know whether the recipe has merit in the 18-inch size.

While I had my calculator and digital scale out to work up an 18-inch NY style dough formulation for Yvonne Marie (see the last post), I also decided to reformulate the basic Lehmann NY style dough recipe for a 17-inch style. One of our fellow members, Crusty, had previously attempted a 17-inch pizza on a screen but using one of the 16-inch dough recipes I had posted. To the extent he would like to try out a formulation for the 17-inch size, I have posted the ingredients and amounts below, along with the baker's percents. The 17-inch formulation will produce a dough ball weight of almost 24 oz. (23.8 oz., to be a bit more exact). I have also posted the volume measurements for those who do not have a scale. The hydration percent I chose was 63%.

Thanks Peter. I made a 16" pie last night directly on the stone and it came out great. This was the same dough formulation I used and had stretched to 17" on the screen. I did not use the screen but may try it again.

I created the table below for hydration levels between 65-60% and pies ranging from 17 down to 12 inches.

Questions:

1. Does the matrix look correct?

2. All of these carry a .10 TF. I would like to learn more about the relative TF numbers. Ideally I would like to make NY Style Street pizzza that has a good size rim and a center that can carry its own weight and be folded. What TF would you recommend?

3. Where can I find a table that relates % to volumetric quanitites....eg., .04oz. yeast ??....what qty is that?

Thank you for all your hard work in creating the matrix. It should come in handy to those who want to make or experiment with the Lehmann NY style dough in different weights/sizes and with different hydration percentages and using the standard thickness factor, TF, for a "thin" crust pizza.

I checked out your data for the 17-inch size and spot checked data in the rest of the tables and it looks like your calculations are correct. My data for the 17-inch Lehmann dough (in a recent post) was a bit different than yours because I had used a thickness factor (TF) of 0.105 (more on this subject below).

Your calculations do a great job of highlighting how difficult it is to deal with small weights of ingredients like yeast, salt, oil (and sugar, when used). Even for flour and water, which weigh much more than the rest of the ingredients, it is hard to get great accuracy. For example, my digital scale is accurate to 0.05 oz., but it can't weigh ingredients any more exactly than that. That is, it can exactly weigh, say 13.50 oz., but it can't exactly weigh 13.49 oz. or 13.51 oz. I usually weigh to the nearest 0.05 oz. or tweak the amount to get it in between the 0-0.05 range. To get better accuracy, I would need a considerably more expensive scale, and to weigh amounts like 0.04 oz., I would need a scale like the Frieling 400 scale that pftaylor is in the process of buying. Since many of our members and readers may not have scales (digital or otherwise) and even for those of us who do but can't weigh the small amounts of lightweight ingredients, we rely on weight-volume conversion data instead.

In the case of ingredients like yeast, sugar, salt and oil, Steve and others on this forum (including myself in the case of IDY) actually weighed larger quantities of such ingredients and converted from weights to volume. In part, this was done because online conversions sites are inconsistent and unreliable in making such conversions. I set forth the conversion data for the abovementioned ingredients at Reply #29 on this thread, and it is that data that I use to convert small quantities like 0.04 oz. to volume measurements. Even then, the conversions aren't one hundred percent accurate. You will frequently get volumes that don't fit within the standard measuring spoon sizes of 1/8, 1/4. 1/2, 1 t., and 1 T. (and combinations thereof). In such cases, I use the closest spoon sizes and approximations.

As for the thickness factor TF, the values I have been using have been pretty much those proposed by people like Tom Lehmann and Big Dave. I started with 0.10 for the Lehmann NY "thin" style and tweaked it based on experience, finally coming up with a "personalized" value of 0.105. For someone else, the number could be higher or lower. I discussed how to come up with a "personal" TF at Reply #42 on this thread. To do this, you have to experiment with different dough ball sizes and note the weights of each dough ball in relation to the diameter of the pizza you are trying to make. When you finally get the dough ball weight that you consider ideal for a particular size (diameter) pizza, you solve for TF in this expression:

TF = W/(3.14 x R x R),

where W is the weight of the "ideal" dough ball and R is the radius of the pizza for which the dough ball is used. So, for example, if you found the ideal dough ball weight for a 16-inch pizza to be 22 oz., the thickness factor TF would have a value of 22 divided by 200.96, or 0.109. Once you have this number, you can use it to calculate the dough ball weight for any other size (diameter) pizza. In that case, you simply rearrange the above expression and solve for W, specifically,

Crusty,It looks like you are now trapped in a vicious cycle. One where each pie you make gets better and better. I want to do two things after looking at your latest effort - make a pie and go for a brisk walk to work off some extra cals.

Mixed for 2 min on stir, added OO then 2 min on stir, final mix was 7 min on 3 setting out of 10. This dough was refrigerated for 44 hours. Brought out to get to room temp for approx 1.5 hours to get to 55 degrees. Baked directly on stone.

Critical factors:

1. 24 hours or more in refirgerator2. dough handling...I press firmly on the center because I do not want bubbles and gentle on the outer rim.3. a stone and oven that have been preheating for 1.5 hours.4. high gluten KASL, stanislaus tomatoes, grande cheese